The Bread of Life

IT is obvious from my bodily figure that I love eating. It is my simple enjoyment to eat, besides I give joy and smile to those who prepared and served the food when I eat a lot. As Andrew Zimmern of Bizarre Foods would say it, “If it looks good, eat it.”

We eat to live. However, eating without balance nutrition could lead to an unhealthy life which may cause early death. We have to know what we eat; every kind of food we take in has an effect on our body. The food affects our health; it either weakens or strengthens our body.

In Gospel from John 6:51-58, Jesus is offering a different kind of food for us. One that will definitely strengthen and nourish us not only our physical body but our soul. He is giving us bread, bread that gives life. Because the bread He is referring to is Himself: “I am the living bread.”

It would be an understatement to say that this living bread, if we choose to take and eat it, will have a good effect on our soul. This living bread will lead us to a holy life. It will not cause us death but will give us life eternal.

Jesus wants us to be one with Him by taking His body. We become what we eat. Receiving the Body of Jesus in the Communion is making Him part of our selves.

It is in the Communion that we are transformed and become “Alter Cristus”, meaning “Another Christ”. Therefore, receiving the Body of Christ gives us greater responsibility because when we become “Another Christ”, it only means that we should act like Him and we should emulate Him.

Taking the Body of Christ, the Bread of Life allows Jesus to increase in us, as we decrease in ourselves.

The Bread of Life signifies Jesus’ sacrificial love for us because He gives Himself fully to us in Holy Communion. Communion is a calling to be with God. Remember we have a prayer before Communion, “Lord, I am not worthy to receive You, but only say the Word and I shall be healed.” Communion means an invitation to those who have lost their way. It means healing to those who are wounded by sin. It means transformation to become holy just as God is holy.

In the Holy Communion we do not receive mere bread but Jesus Himself. When we take and receive the Body of Jesus, we allow Him to permeate us and come into our lives, enter our hearts.

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